News you can use
News you can use
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HELENA — A Montana family and their accountant are accused of tacking $70 million in bogus charges onto customer phone bills nationwide, then funneling some of that money through a religious organization to buy land and pay for the husband's legal bills. Steven Sann, his wife Terry, son Nathan and accountant Robert Braach run a maze of nine companies engaged in "cramming, " or adding unauthorized charges to a customer's phone bill, according to a civil complaint filed this month by the Federal Trade Commission. When c...
HELENA (AP) — Flu outbreaks are spreading across Montana, with one death reported and 57 people hospitalized so far, a state health official said Friday. Influenza cases have been reported in all but 18 of Montana's 56 counties, and the number of cases is expected to increase for at least a few more weeks, said Department of Public Health and Human Services spokesman Jon Ebelt. "It does seem to be shaping up to be our worst flu season since 2009," he said. Montana is one of 47 states where flu is considered widespread, in w...
HELENA (AP) — A power struggle that has splintered the Blackfeet Indians' governing council and divided the tribe is moving beyond the reservation's boundaries. The intra-tribal political feud has been escalating for nearly a year, leading to the dismissal or suspension of several members of the Blackfeet Tribal Business Council and leaving just five of its nine members to make decisions for the governing body. The division has led to accusations of corruption by supporters of both factions and street protests outside t...
HELENA (AP) — An advocacy group told a judge Thursday that a new voter-approved law unconstitutionally requires state agencies to determine who is an illegal immigrant and turn them over to federal authorities. The plaintiffs led by the Montana Immigrant Justice Alliance asked District Judge Jeffrey Sherlock to block the law, which requires proof of citizenship or legal standing from any applicant for state services, such as unemployment benefits and assistance for crime victims. The law, which was approved by nearly 80 p...
HELENA (AP) — A new voter-approved Montana law that requires an individual to provide proof of citizenship to receive state services does not apply to the university system, an associate commissioner for higher education said Wednesday. The state constitution gives the Board of Regents exclusive authority to manage and control the university system, including setting policies and regulations, Kevin McRae said. The new law that requires proof of citizenship or legal residency for services infringes on that constitutional a...
HELENA — A sharply divided Montana Supreme Court has ruled that forcing a Hutterite religious colony to pay workers' compensation insurance for jobs outside the commune is not an unconstitutional intrusion into religion. The 4-3 decision upholds a 2009 law requiring religious organizations to carry workers' compensation insurance, which the Legislature passed after businesses complained they could not outbid the religious workers. The Big Sky Colony of Hutterites in northwestern Montana sued, saying the law targeted its r...
HELENA — Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Hill's campaign has had to freeze all media advertising, polling and travel since last Thursday to comply with a state judge's order not to spend a disputed $500,000 donation, campaign manager Brock Lowrance said Monday. Lowrance testified as attorneys for Hill's opponent, Democratic Attorney General Steve Bullock, asked District Judge Kathy Seeley to issue a preliminary injunction preventing Hill from spending the Montana Republican Party donation for the Nov. 6 election. T...
Governor candidates meet in debate in Great Falls GREAT FALLS — All three candidates for governor met for the first time Friday in a debate that focused on agricultural issues but skirted the one topic that has come to dominate the race's final days — a disputed $500,000 donation to Republican Rick Hill. The debate held at the Montana Farmers Union's annual convention in Great Falls was the sixth meeting between Republican Rick Hill and Democrat Steve Bullock. But it's the first time Libertarian candidate Ron Vandevender has...
HELENA — A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that juveniles whose identities otherwise would be protected can be required to publicly register as sex offenders. An incident at Rocky Boy's Indian Reservation prompted the federal lawsuit. The 9th U. S. Circuit of Appeals denied the argument by three males in Montana — including a boy who was 14 at the time of the offense — who said lower-court judges should not have sentenced them to register as offenders for sex crimes committed when they were children. The Rocky Boy r...
HELENA — The $47 million U. S. Senate race between Democrat Jon Tester and Republican Denny Rehberg was Montana's top news story of 2012, according to The Associated Press' annual poll of state editors. The 2012 election dominated the year's top stories, with five of the top 10 involving the senate and gubernatorial races, Republicans' failure to make expected electoral gains, the role of secretive money in campaigning and a referendum on medical marijuana restrictions. Editors overwhelmingly chose the bruising Tester-Rehberg...
HELENA — A federal judge on Friday said he won't intervene in a state lawsuit between Democrat Steve Bullock and Republican Rick Hill over the legality of a $500,000 donation to Hill's campaign for governor. The ruling is a win for Bullock, the attorney general, who is suing Hill in state court to force the former congressman to return the donation from the Montana Republican Party. U.S. District Judge Charles Lovell denied a request by conservative groups to find Bullock in contempt for filing the lawsuit. Lovell also d...
GREAT FALLS (AP) — All three candidates for governor have met for the first time in a debate less than two weeks before the election. Friday's debate in Great Falls was the sixth meeting between Republican Rick Hill and Democrat Steve Bullock. But it's the first for Libertarian candidate Ron Vandevender. The debate held at the Montana Farmers Union annual convention focused mainly on agricultural issues. The candidates discussed funding for agriculture research, how to keep Montana's Extension Service program going, r...
HELENA — A Montana medical marijuana provider staring down an 80-year prison sentence has become something of a martyr among pot advocates, but he's not finding much support for his constitutional challenge of the federal raids that landed him in jail. Chris Williams was the only provider among those indicted after the 2011 raids on more than a dozen medical marijuana operations across Montana who rejected multiple plea deals and insisted on a jury trial on the eight drug trafficking and weapons charges he faced. AP P...
HELENA — Buoyed by the success of voter initiatives in Washington and Colorado, an East Helena medical marijuana advocate has refiled a proposal to make the recreational use of pot a constitutional right in Montana. The proposed constitutional initiative by Barb Trego is the first 2014 ballot question submitted to the secretary of state for approval. It duplicates the one she put forward last year, but which did not make it on the 2012 ballot because backers failed to collect the required signatures in time. Trego is a m...
HELENA— A phone book company has settled a lawsuit over its placement of a Montana restaurant in the "Animal Carcass Removal" section of its yellow pages, a listing the restaurant owner says cost him customers and made him the butt of a Jay Leno joke. The terms of the Nov. 16 deal between Dex Media Inc. and Big Sky Beverage Inc., the parent company of Bar 3 Bar-B-Q, were not disclosed. A tentative agreement proposed in September said a deal would include a payment to the restaurant owner. Restaurant owner Hunter Lacey sued D...
HELENA — The Supreme Court refused a request Tuesday to overturn a court order that keeps Montana's campaign contribution limits intact through the election. American Tradition Partnership and 11 other conservative groups, individuals and businesses seeking to toss out the limits had appealed to Justice Anthony Kennedy, asking him to lift the order by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals keeping them in place. Kennedy denied the application in a one-sentence statement released by the Supreme Court's public information o...
HELENA (AP) — Conservative groups and individuals seeking to dismantle Montana's campaign contribution limits are trying to force Democrat Steve Bullock to drop a lawsuit against Rick Hill, his Republican opponent in the race for governor. Bullock, the state's attorney general, is suing Hill over a $500,000 contribution the former congressman accepted from the Montana Republican Party on Oct. 5. Two days earlier, U.S. District Judge Charles Lovell ruled the contribution limits were unconstitutional, but the 9th U.S. C...
HELENA — Montana officials gave their initial approval Thursday to a plan that would let hunters kill bison that stray beyond designated areas north of Yellowstone National Park and from the Fort Peck and Fort Belknap Indian reservations. The plan is to remove bison that wander outside of defined "tolerance areas" beyond the park and where wild Yellowstone bison have been slated for transfer, such as the two northeastern Montana reservations. AP Photo/The Livingston Enterprise, Garrett Cheen, File Mounted Yellowstone N...
HELENA — In the six days between a judge tossing out Montana's campaign contribution limits and an appellate court reinstating them, the Montana Republican Party dumped $500,000 into Rick Hill's campaign in the former congressman's tight race for governor. Hill's opponent, Democrat Steve Bullock, called Hill's acceptance of the donation a crime. The state GOP also donated $32,000 to attorney general candidate Tim Fox in that time, and tried but failed to assemble donors for Sandy Welch, the Republican trying to unseat O...
HELENA — Blue Cross Blue Shield of Montana will become part of the nation's fourth-largest health insurer, Chicago-based Health Care Service Corp., the heads of the two companies said Monday. The deal, which the companies are calling an "alliance," is subject to regulatory approval, which will determine the company's final form. HCSC has 13 million members in Blue Cross Blue Shield plans in Illinois, Texas, Oklahoma and New Mexico. Blue Cross Blue Shield is Montana's largest insurer with 272,000 members. Mike Frank, the p...
HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Montana's top education official urged school leaders Friday to review their emergency plans and procedures in the wake of a Connecticut school shooting that killed 20 children and six adults. Every public school in Montana is required to have a plan to respond to all kinds of emergencies, from an intruder to a fire to a bomb threat. Such a plan is meant to minimize the risk of a tragedy such as the one that unfolded Friday morning in Newtown, Conn. But there is no requirement or set process for M...
HELENA (AP) — A judge on Thursday extended his temporary block of restrictions on medical marijuana providers while he considers whether the state can eliminate access to the drug for some of the most seriously ill patients in the interest of curbing abuse. District Judge James Reynolds did not immediately rule on whether to grant a preliminary injunction that would indefinitely block the state from implementing a ban on compensation for medical marijuana providers or limiting them to distributing marijuana to three p...
Rick Hill and Steve Bullock debated abortion and gay rights Wednesday as social issues made for the liveliest exchanges in their fourth meeting in the campaign for Montana governor. Hill, a former Republican congressman, said he believes abortion is the destruction of a human being. Hill said he supports moderate measures that limit abortions, such as a ballot question in the Nov. 6 election that would require the parental notification of girls under 16 who seek an abortion. "There is a lot we can do in the middle of the road...
HELENA — Attorney General Steve Bullock is holding onto his lead in the money race among gubernatorial candidates. Candidates for statewide office on Thursday filed their campaign finance reports detailing how much money they spent and took in over the last three months. The deadline comes as the 2012 campaigns start to ratchet up with the new year. Bullock's campaign reported raising $160,691.12 between October and December. That and the $549,242 he has raised to date are tops among candidates from either party. The D...
HELENA — The dispute between a ranch for troubled children adopted abroad and the Montana officials who want it either regulated or closed may come down to how a judge defines what a church is. On one side, Ranch For Kids owner Joyce Sterkel says her boarding school in Eureka near the Canadian border should be free from state oversight because of an exemption in the law for ministries of local churches. She and the head of the Epicenter International Missions Ministry signed a memorandum of understanding in October 2011 m...
